In order to conserve energy, an increasing number of homeowners and building contractors are installing insulation throughout their buildings. In many cases the area to be insulated is a cavity in a wall, roof or floor of the building. One type of insulation often used for such cavities is blown-in insulation. Blown-in insulation comprises an insulating material which can be injected into a cavity via air-pressure. A number of different products have been used in the past to fabricate blown-in insulation (i.e. cellulose fiber, fiberglass, rockwool, etc.).
The level of insulation required (the R-value), and therefore the type and amount of insulation used, is dependent on the characteristics of the specific area to be insulated. Insulation manufacturers are constantly searching for low cost materials which exhibit sufficient insulating properties and can be provided into a form suitable for blowing into a cavity. Logically, a less expensive insulating material, which can be used for an application requiring a given R-value, is more desirable.
Fly ash is a coal byproduct which occurs as spherical particles usually ranging in diameter from 0.5 to 100 microns. Depending on the specific makeup of the coal used, when coal is burned, fly ash makes up anywhere from 10 to 85% of the coal ash residue. Up to 20% of fly ash consists of cenospheres, which are lightweight spheres of silicate glass filled with nitrogen and carbon dioxide that float in water. This makes pond disposal of coal ash very difficult as the cenospheres are apt to create a suspended solids problem in the pond. Also, there are significant environmental restrictions and costs associated with other forms of disposal. Therefore, power plants and other producers of fly ash are extremely willing to sell large quantities of fly ash at a relatively modest price (a considerably lower price than an equal volume of standard insulating materials).
Thus, it would be advantageous to use fly ash as an insulating material due to its availability and low cost. In addition, creating insulating material from fly ash provides a productive use for an ordinarily undesirable byproduct.
Another type of insulation commonly used to insulate cavities in buildings is batt-type insulation. Batt insulation normally comprises blocks of packaged insulation having predetermined dimensions dependent on the size of the cavity to be insulated. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the packaging surrounding a block of batt insulation 300 is typically made large enough that flaps 304 having a narrow width are provided around the perimeter of a block 300 for fastening purposes. It is commonplace to use fasteners such as staples 308 to attach the flaps 304 to the frame 316 of a cavity to be insulated, thereby securing the batt block 300 in place. Note, while FIG. 1 illustrates flaps 304 being attached to the back panel of frame 316, flaps 304 may alternatively be attached to the side walls of frame 316.
One of the problems with this method of securing batt insulation in a cavity is that gaps 312 may be left between the frame 316 and the insulation block 300 in order to provide a surface on the frame to which the flaps 304 may be fastened. Such gaps 312 of uninsulated space tend to lessen the overall insulating effectiveness of the batt insulation 300.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide a method and apparatus for attaching batt insulation to a frame defining a cavity to be insulated which does not leave gaps of uninsulated space in the cavity which lessen the insulating effectiveness of the batt insulation while simultaneously providing a means for securing the batt insulation in place.